Leading scorers in the game were Alaina Forbes of Midlakes and Ryann Stefaniak of Batavia. Forbes and Stefaniak both put on a clinic, dropping 35 points apiece.

It was all Blue Devils in the first half, as they went to the locker room with a 32-24 lead. Batavia was led by Stefaniak in the opening half, as she dropped 20 points, with 18 of those points coming from beyond the three-point line.

But Midlakes came out in the second half clearly on a mission. After trailing by eight, the Screaming Eagles went on a 25-7 run to take a 49-39 lead with less than a minute remaining in the third quarter.

Midlakes head coach Nate Rich discussed Stefaniak’s hot first half and how the team turned things around in the second half.

“I’m very happy with the way we played in the second half,” Rich explained. “Ryann Stefaniak, she was just on fire in the first half. I actually thought we did a pretty good job on her, but she just hit tough, contested threes that gave them the lead. I thought we did a better job of staying with her in the second half. We got lucky that she cooled off a little bit.

“We really pushed the pace. In the second half I thought we played a lot faster than we did in the first half.”

Midlakes entered the final quarter with a 54-41 lead, and that provided plenty of cushion. Scoring was even between the two teams in the fourth quarter, resulting in the 79-66 victory for the Screaming Eagles.

With the win, the Screaming Eagles have now won Section V titles in back-to-back seasons. It’s a record-setting feat for the Midlakes girls basketball program.

“It’s something that’s never been done in school history on the girls side. No one has even won back-to-back titles,” Rich said. “So, that’s a very cool thing for us to have accomplished this year.

“This team had big goals to start the season. First one was a league title, second one was a Sectional title, and we definitely want to get back to that state tournament. But we know Dansville’s going to be very tough for us to get back there."

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